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DIY Brides these days are my heroes. The pretty they can whip up just blows my wedding-loving mind, and this lovely Bride is a fine example. Her perfectly crafted day filled the gorgeous pictures from The Bird and The Bear with so much love, I simply can’t get over it. Sprinkle in some gorgeous florals from Petals, Ink., and lovelies, we’ve got one gorgeous gallery on our hands. See it all here.

From Petals Ink… It’s impossible not to adore all of the handmade details of this wedding. Colors and textures collide to create a delight for the senses in a picturesque, Texas Hill Country Venue. Fringe garland, ruffled icing, succulents in tiny clay pots, wooden and lit signage throughout! But beyond all the lovely details, there is this gorgeous couple so obviously, wildly in love with each other. Nothing ever tops that!

From the Bride… My husband and I knew we had to get married in Austin, Texas; it’s a short drive down the road from our alma mater, Baylor, where we met our freshman year. The only problem was, I had moved home to Pennsylvania after I graduated while he finished an extra semester, and he was about to move back to California to start his new job after he graduated! So, in a nutshell, it was complicated from the start. But we were heart set that was the place, so we made it work! I planned the entire wedding while living on the east coast, which was definitely a challenge. I had to give up on a lot of my initial dreams and ideas because it just wasn’t possible with the distance. But in the end, it all turned out perfectly and many of those “crushed” dreams were forgotten. We wanted to get married as soon as we could, and I had to have an outdoor wedding, so that complicated things as well with the summer heat in Texas. We finally chose June 16, a little over 6 months from the day we got engaged. My goals when planning the wedding were: be frugal, make it personal, and make it casual. It was never in the budget for me to hire a full-on wedding planner, but I did take some advice from a few friends and hired a day-of coordinator who was absolutely amazing (I would say that was worth every penny to not have stress for anyone the day of the wedding).

I wanted the day to feel like a backyard party; casual and really fun. I hand made almost everything. I wanted my hands to be in all the details so that they would be super personalized to fit us as a couple. I worked around the color scheme of green and yellow (for Baylor, where we met at our freshman orientation), and worked it into yellow and mint and then with some blues and turquoises thrown in. I played a lot with different design elements, so I didn’t have one specific theme. It was kind of colorful-meets-rustic-meets-DIY. All the wooden signs I made out of old shipping pallets, my mom hand sewed the streamers draped in the barn, and we both scoured vintage and thrift shops for months for antique items to place around for an added rustic look.

I would say I am very laid-back and a nontraditional bride. My main focuses were the personalization of all the details, the photography and the food and desserts! The dress was probably last on my list. I had a really hard time spending so much on a dress that I would only wear once (it looked great though)! My mother actually handmade the one-shoulder lace jacket I wore for the ceremony. She sewed on the buttons from her (and my nana’s) wedding dress for a personal touch. It turned out perfectly, and it was fun to transition to another look after the ceremony! The day of the wedding, it was a perfect sunny day with a bit of a breeze to cut the summer heat. Half of our guests were from California (and struggled a bit in the heat) and the other half were from Texas. We got married in front of an old mantle I found at a thrift store that I had my dad prop upright and add a frame on top. The hole of the frame and the open part of the mantle had a perfect view of the Texas Hill country; it was absolutely beautiful. I struggled a little bit during the ceremony because the sun was shining right in my eyes, but it actually helped me not cry as much as I probably would have! Spencer, on the other hand, was a mess. It was so sweet! One thing I will never forget was being at the reception and seeing so many faces, all of which I knew and had a personal story with. It was the coolest experience ever to have so many people who meant so much to us in the same place, celebrating us. Our photographers, Caryn and Brian from the Bird and the Bear did an absolutely phenomenal job capturing the day. I have never been more proud of something in my life, seeing all my ideas come to life after such hard work!